My husband put himself in first class and me in row thirty-four on our twenty-fifth anniversary. Four hours into that flight the captain asked for me by name.

At the front galley the flight deck door opened and the captain came out.

Forty-something. Four bars. And I looked at that man’s face and I could not get any air at all.

And then I saw what was on the galley counter next to him.

My hand went over my mouth.

Behind me Gideon had got as far forward as the crew would allow, and he saw the captain, and then he saw what was on that counter, and his face went from red to white in about one second.

“What the hell,” he said. “What the hell is this.”

PART 2 — 1999

His name is Ilan Ferris and in 1999 he was fifteen and he lived four doors down from us on Kellard Road.

I am not going to write about what was happening in that house because it is his and because his mother is still alive.

What I will write is that from the autumn of 1999 until he was eighteen, that boy ate at my table most nights of the week.